The proposed work is concerned with the study of the conformation and dynamics of chromatin using techniques of fluorescence spectroscopy. More specifically, it is of interest to test the hypothesis that the histones and DNA in chromatin are organized into a flexible chain of nucleosomes separated by spacer DNA of about 50 base pairs. The nucleosome is postulated to consist of an octamer of H2a, H2b, H3 and H4 with the DNA wrapped around the octamer. The first step in this study is to determine the conformation and flexibility of monomer nucleosomes. This is done by nanosecond fluorescence polarization techniques using monomer nucleosomes (produced by digestion of chromatin with micrococcal nuclease) labelled with fluorophores that bind either to DNA or histones. These measurements give information on the flexibility, shape and size of the monomer nucleosome. The next step is concerned with polarized fluorescence studies of oligonucleosomes which give information on the motions between the nucleosomes in chromatin. Finally, proximity relations between histones and DNA are to be studied using the fluorescence technique of excitation energy transfer.